Reason : The A-cat has a double forestay and so keeping the pole up is an issue. There is no bridle strop to tie a line off to that holds the pole up and because he wanted to use the snail snuffer system he could not have a third forestay that holds up the spi pole, it would interfere with the snuffing operation. Therefor Hakan (and marstrom) uses poles rather then lines. An additional issue with double (triple) forestays is that it can be more difficult to gybe the spinnaker around the stays. And in some cases the twin forestays can prevent the spinnaker from being sheeting in properly. This happens when the forestays are far forward on the boat or when the spi pole is relatively short.

In my experience a single forestay and a mid pole alu ring snuffer system is the best system available. You take a small hit in pointing ability with the midpole snuffer, that is true, but in the way of handling it is more dependable and smoother in operation. It also allows a greater range of sheeting.

Personally I don't ever expect to see double forestays in the F16 class, not even with dedicated singlehander F16 versions. The advantages of improved platform stiffness simply don't outweight the drawbacks in handling. The fact that F16's were always intend to fly a jib helped us out in this respect. Our bows are more then strong enough to take the bridle strop and allows the sailors to keep the single forestay. I don't think this modification can be done on modern A-cats.

Wouter